shapes—at least a dozen. Mostly likely the king, his daughter, and the remaining guards.
So the spell was ready. Now Goranik only needed a snow-haired king or princess—or feral prince—to finish it.
Lizzan reached for Aerax’s arm and squeezed. Wordlessly he shook his head.
He would not stay here in the corridor while she and Saxen and Caeb went in.
She sighed, and he brushed his finger against her chin. The chin that he’d told her that he’d always loved. She lifted it stubbornly, just for him. He grinned at her, filling her racing heart with unrestrained emotion.
Then, gripping his knives, silently and swiftly he went in with Caeb at his side.
Lizzan raced in, going left as Aerax went right, heading for the viswan in their circle. Goranik turned, and she had but a glimpse of the gray face that had featured in her nightmares just before Saxen slammed into him with such strength and speed that Lizzan felt the impact through her chest. Then her blade sliced through the first viswan’s neck, and she spun toward the next as he fell back, chant over and desperately spitting out a spell that Lizzan cut short by jabbing the point of her sword into his throat.
She yanked it out and charged for the next, aware of Caeb’s roar and a scream that ended at the rip of the cat’s teeth—or Aerax’s. More heavy thuds seemed to pound through the very air. She was around the side of the crystal chamber now and couldn’t see what was happening between the Lithans or how far Aerax and Caeb had gotten, could see only the scrambling panic of the viswan who must have thought themselves so near to victory.
A blast of wind hit her face and she dove out of its path, whipping her dagger toward the nearest monk. She cared not if it hit a throat—she only had to break the viswan’s concentration. A cry of pain ended the gale, and then Lizzan was on her feet again, charging toward the woman yanking the dagger from her side.
A flare of orange light and a wave of heat came from the other side of the chamber, and the stone ceiling shook with Caeb’s roar of pain.
Saxen flew through the air and slammed into a wall. She heard the snap of bone but couldn’t turn, stabbing through lungs that would stop a spell as effectively as through a throat. Saxen shouted a warning, but Lizzan’s speed was no match for either a silver-blooded king or a demon. Pain ripped through her head and neck as Goranik whipped her aside by the tail of her hair. Another hard blow sent agony shooting down her shoulder and she crumpled to the ground next to Saxen.
Not a blow, but the impact into a wall. Gasping for breath, she crawled onto her knees, saw the shattered blade of her sword. Beside her, Saxen seemed a jumble of broken bones. Blood dripped from his mouth and his ears, and he still clutched the hammer’s handle, though the thick wood was splintered and the hammerhead gone. The sharp end of a fractured bone pierced the flesh of his upper forearm.
“I will be up . . . in a moment.” Each word sounded glutted with blood, as if his insides were as broken as his outsides.
They did not have a moment. His face singed bald, Caeb faced the oncoming demon, snarling. Behind him, Aerax tossed the body of the last viswan aside, then spit out the blood and flesh he’d torn from their throat. Gore covered his jaw and chest, and his dark eyes met Lizzan’s across the distance.
Between them, Goranik paused and laughed. “A true bounty this realm has given.” The sound of his amusement squirmed over her skin like a wet gutworm, and she knew not if his voice was his own or the demon’s, or if there was any difference between them. “When I sent my bandits to attack your army, I had only hoped their sacrifice would create the ice wraiths to reduce your soldiers’ numbers and ease my path across. Instead I discovered how many souls were locked away on this island.”
Aerax’s gaze hardened. “It was your spell that created those wraiths?”
That killed Lizzan’s friends. Her father.
All of them trapped beneath this palace . . . and who Goranik would make stone wraiths of now, imprisoning them forever in that corrupted and twisted form.
She could not allow it. Lizzan’s gaze sought her dagger. It lay on the floor only a few